It is easy to see that the Nation, thus defined, must possess elements of perpetuity.

It is not a quicksand, or mere agglomeration of particles, liable to disappear, but a solid, infrangible crystallization, against which winds and rains beat in vain.

Opposed to this prevailing tendency is the earlier propensity to local sovereignty, which is so gratifying to petty pride and ambition.

This propensity, assuming various forms in different ages and countries, according to the degree of development, has always been a species of egotism.

When the barbarous islanders of the Pacific imagined themselves the whole world, they furnished an illustration of this egotism in its primitive form.

For purposes of local self-government, and to secure its educational and political blessings, the States are of unquestioned value.

But local sovereignty, whether in the name of State or prince, is out of place and incongruous under a government truly national.

It is entirely inconsistent with the idea of Nation.

The rebellion began; but each member soon found that its own welfare was bound up inseparably with the rest, and especially that in weakening the “belly” it weakened every part.

Would you know the incalculable mischief of State pretensions?

There are, first, our Indians, aborigines of the soil, split into tribes, possessing a barbarous independence, but through this perverse influence kept in constant strife, with small chance of improvement.

Turning the back upon union, they turn the back upon civilization itself.

There is, next, our neighbor republic, Mexico, where Nature is bountiful in vain, and climate lends an unavailing charm, while twenty-three States, unwilling to recognize the national power, set up their disorganizing pretensions, and…

Civil war, wasted treasure, debt, wounds, and death are the witnesses.

With wailing voice all these cry out against the deadly enemy lurking in State pretensions.

Alliances, leagues, and confederations were ineffectual against State pretensions.

Amidst all the triumphs of genius and the splendors of art, there was no national life, and Greece died.

From her venerable sepulchre, with ever-burning funeral lamps, where was buried so much of mortal beauty, there is a constant voice of warning, which sounds across continent and ocean, echoing “Beware!

But this dominion was of force, ending in universal empire, where the consent of the governed was of little account.

How incalculably different from a well-ordered Nation, where all is natural, and the people are knit together in self-imposed bonds!

Here again was universal empire, but there was no Nation.

Wherever its influence subsided, the Nation began to appear; and now, wherever its influence still lingers on earth, there the yearnings for national life, instinctive in the popular heart, are for the time suppressed.

Curiously enough, Sweden and Hungary were not brought within the sphere of Feudalism, and these two outlying lands, left free to natural impulses, revealed themselves at an early day as Nations.

When the European continent was weakened by anarchy, they were already strong in national life, with an influence beyond their population or means.

Feudalism has left its traces in England; but it was never sufficiently strong in that sea-girt land to resist the natural tendencies to unity, partly from its insular position, and partly from the character of its people.